The Princess and the Pea

Tonight’s story comes from Denmark, a small country in northern Europe with old castles and cold sea winds. Hans Christian Andersen wrote it almost two hundred years ago, and children all over the world still read it.

Once upon a time there was a prince. He wanted to marry a princess, but she had to be a real princess.

So he travelled all over the world to find one. He met a great many princesses. There were princesses enough, but he could never be sure they were real. There was always something about them that wasn’t quite right. In the end he came home again, very sad, because he wanted a real princess so much.

One evening there was a terrible storm. Thunder rumbled, lightning flashed, and the rain poured down. It was a dreadful night.

In the middle of it all, there was a knock at the castle gate, and the old king went to open it himself.

Outside stood a girl. Goodness, what the rain and wind had done to her! Water streamed from her hair and her clothes, ran in at the toes of her shoes and out at the heels. And yet she said she was a real princess.

“Well, we’ll soon find out,” thought the old queen. But she didn’t say a word.

She went into the guest bedroom, took all the bedding off the bed, and put one pea on the bottom. On top of the pea she piled twenty mattresses. And on top of the twenty mattresses she piled twenty thick eiderdown quilts.

That night the princess had to sleep on this towering bed. She needed a ladder to climb up.

In the morning they asked her how she had slept.

“Oh, terribly!” said the princess. “I hardly closed my eyes all night. Heaven knows what was in that bed. I was lying on something hard, and now I’m black and blue all over. It was simply dreadful!”

Then they knew she really was a real princess, because she had felt the pea through twenty mattresses and twenty eiderdown quilts. Nobody but a real princess could be so delicate.

So the prince married her, for now he knew for certain he had found a real princess.

And the pea was put in the royal museum, where you can still see it today, if nobody has taken it.

There, that’s a true story!